At the end of the Ming Dynasty and the beginning of the Qing Dynasty, there were always moving legends along the Qinhuai River, among which the Eight Beauties of Qinhuai were the most popular. A generation of beauties, either sad or crazy, talented and fierce women, with a long history, left for future generations to comment on.

Eight Beauties of Qinhuai

Dong Xiaowan

Dong Xiaowan is from Jinling, and her talent and beauty are the highest among Qinhuai singers. "The heavenly posture is exquisite and the appearance is beautiful." She especially loves Li Bai and compares herself to Li Bai. She wrote many poems and paintings, and the Wuxi Municipal Museum still has a "Colorful Butterfly Picture" she painted when she was fifteen. Her love affair with Mao Bijiang, due to Mao Bijiang's 10,000-word article "Yingmei'an Reminiscences" written in memory of her, made them the most commendable erotic story of the union of a talented man and a beautiful woman in the Qinhuai brothel. . The story of Dong Xiaowan's union with the talented man and the beautiful woman from the border area is somewhat similar to some stories in Pu Songling's "Liao Zhai". Mao Bijiang was an outstanding romantic talent, but he was very poor. After he fell in love with Dong Xiaowan, Qian Qianyi paid three thousand gold for Dong Xiaowan's ransom, so that they could become good friends for a hundred years.

After the fall of the Southern Ming Dynasty, Mao Pijiang did not surrender to the Qing Dynasty like Qian Qianyi, Wumeicun, Gong Dingshan and others. Instead, he left Nanjing and fled. After Mao and Dong fled to Yancheng, Mao Bijiang unfortunately fell seriously ill. Dong Xiaowan served around him and took good care of him, so that Mao Bijiang survived the disaster. But Dong Xiaowan became seriously ill due to overwork. Not long after she fled to Rugao, Jiangsu, a generation of famous prostitutes perished in troubled times at the age of only 27.

Bian Yujing

"The six armies are mourning and they are all pure, and they are angry and beautiful" is a poem written by Wu Meicun for Wu Sangui. Wumeicun was a great poet of the Ming and Qing dynasties, as famous as Qian Qianyi at that time. There is a famous scenic spot in Nanjing - Jiming Temple, where Wumei Village once lived. The love between Wumeicun and Bian Yujing, a famous Qinhuai prostitute, is a euphemistic and sad story, which almost affected the entire subsequent life of Wumeicun. Especially in his later years, Wumeicun wrote many poems to regret this love.

Gu Mei

"Water is the wave of eyes." Gu Mei, who called herself Mrs. Hengbo, enjoyed all the glory and wealth during her lifetime, and was buried with a grand ceremony after her death. As the wife of Shangshu, she was awarded the "First Grade Canon" by the Qing Empire. After his death, all the princes, nobles, literati and bachelors in the capital came to pay their respects. In many places, especially in the Jiangnan area, literati and bachelors set up halls to hold memorial ceremonies. But the most romantic and legendary experience in her life was her love story with Yu Huai, the author of "Banqiao Miscellaneous Notes".

The period between the Ming and Qing Dynasties was the period when Qinhuai singing girls were most famous. Qinhuai singing girls are somewhat different from those in other places. The Qinhuai singers and prostitutes were both talented and beautiful, and were the product of the culture of the scholar-bureaucrats in the south of the Yangtze River. Many years after Gu Mei's death, Yuan Mei, a great scholar and poet of the Qing Dynasty, still praised her endlessly. As for Sui Garden in Nanjing where Yuan Mei lived, according to research, the Grand View Garden in Dream of Red Mansions was written based on Sui Garden. Helplessly, it was burned down by the Taiping Heavenly Kingdom and Yuan Mei's collection of more than 300,000 books.

Liu Rushi

I remember that Ru Shi was first born in Guijiayuan, Shengze, in the Unofficial History. Her surname was Yang and her given name was Ai, while Liu was the "Yu" surname. The first person recorded to have a close relationship with her was Zhang Ximing (Fu), the leader of the Fushe Party. This is a very important clue, indicating that she had a relationship with the political circles of the late Ming Dynasty when she began to enter society. Another famous story follows: She dressed like a Confucian scholar, went to Songjiang to visit Chen Wozi, handed her a business card and called herself "female brother". She wanted to marry Chen Zilong. This period of karma did not work out. The "unofficial history" said that Chen Zilong was "serious and unfriendly", but it seems that this is not the real reason.

Li Xiangjun

Li Xiangjun was a famous prostitute in Qinhuai in the late Ming Dynasty. She was the most romantic and tragic figure in the collapse of the Southern Ming Dynasty. From Li Xiangjun, we can see a microcosm of the tragedy of Nanming. Li Xiangjun learned various arts from artists since she was a child, and was proficient in music, poetry, and the silk and bamboo pipa. She was especially good at southern music, and her sweet singing voice was deeply admired by travelers from all over the world. Hou Fangyu was originally from Henan. He came to Jinling to find a job because he was admired for the culture of Jiangnan. Hou Fangyu is suave and talented, and is a celebrity in the "Fushe". He met Mao Pijiang, Chen Zhenhui, and Fang Yizhi on the banks of the Qinhuai River, and they were known as the Four Young Masters.

They gathered in the Qinhuai Pavilion all day long, talking about poetry and lyrics, and having fun with prostitutes. Wu Jingzi once described his debauched life in the Qinhuai Song Pavilion, "Recently, I have been so angry and extravagant that I spent a lot of money to buy drunkenness. The old actor and the little barbarian lie up in bed, uninhibited and foolish." It can also be imagined from this, The Fourth Young Master was laughing wildly in the Qinhuai Song Tower.

Ma Xianglan

Spring doves ring in the corner of the apricot house, and the fragrance of agarwood lingers lazily downstairs. Cut the pomegranate into a new look, and don't let others see the double hook of jade.

This poem was written by a poet named Lu at that time who ridiculed Ma Xianglan for making a new skirt to cover her feet so that no one could see her. Among the Eight Beauties of Qinhuai, Ma Xianglan was not only praised for her poetry, drama, and painting, but she was also famous among Qinhuai singing girls for her big feet.

Although Ma Xianglan is a singer, she never entertains vulgar guests. She herself has high attainments in calligraphy, painting and drama. In the modern "Cihai", there is an entry about Ma Xianglan. She once had a relationship with Wang Dengya, a talented man from Jiangnan, and has always been in love with him. On Wang Dengya's 70th birthday, she specially raised funds to buy a big boat and took hundreds of prostitutes from Qinhuai to Suzhou to celebrate Wang Dengya's birthday. Wherever the boat went, it became a spectacle for a while, and people along the coast competed to see the beauty of the Qinhuai singing girls. When she was fifty years old, her beauty had not faded, and she was pursued by a young man who asked to marry her. However, Ma Xianglan replied: There is a brothel girl who is over fifty years old and picks up a dustpan and broom to be his bride. Wife's. Ma Xianglan's words became a good talk for a while.

After her death, Ma Xianglan was buried under the Bifeng Temple in Bailuzhou Park on the bank of the Qinhuai River. Although she was a singing girl, she still occupied a position in Qinhuai culture and even in Chinese culture.

Kou Baimen

When Kou Baimen was eighteen years old, he walked out of the brothel and married Zhu Guobi, a prominent hero of the Nanming court. The wedding scene at that time was the first in Nanjing since the Ming Dynasty. The biggest wedding ever. According to the rules of the time, all marriages of prostitutes must be held quietly at night. However, Zhu Guobi ignored the etiquette and carried Kou Baimen's heavily decorated and heavily decorated sedan into the sedan with five thousand soldiers holding double "happy" lanterns. , standing from Wuding Bridge in Nanjing to the front of Zhu's house in Neiqiao. The music was played all the way, the suonas shook the sky, and the cannon salutes shocked the sky. The wedding of a brothel singer actually surpassed that of a wealthy woman. This moved Kou Baimen his whole life. So later, after the failure of the Nanming court, Zhu Guobi was imprisoned in Beijing. In order to survive, Zhu Guobi planned to sell all the singers and maids in the family to redeem his life. Although Kou Baimen was saddened by Zhu Guobi's ruthlessness, he After deciding with Zhu Guobi, he still raised 20,000 taels of gold for Zhu Guobi and redeemed his body.

Since then, Kou Baimen returned to the Qinhuai Gelou. He was drunk and dreaming every day, hanging out with literati and poets, drinking and poetry, and then unfortunately fell ill. At that time, there was a scholar named Han Sheng. He and Kou Baimen had a relationship. However, when Kou Baimen was ill, one night, when Kou Baimen begged him to sleep next to her for the night, Han Sheng did not miss the old relationship. , pushed Kou Baimen's hand away, abandoned her, and teased one of her maids in the next room. After Kou Baimen heard this, he was filled with grief and indignation, and his illness worsened. Within a few days, a generation of chivalrous and passionate brothel girls sadly passed away and returned to immortality.

Chen Yuanyuan

In the Eight Beauties of Qinhuai, Chen Yuanyuan, like Diao Chan and Xi Shi, played a "disaster" role in major events at critical moments in history. Not only did she let Wu Sangui get angry and lure the Qing troops into the pass, and give the great Han Dynasty to the Manchus, but she also made Wu Shangui bear the charge of a big traitor after his death. She also let the so-called million-strong army Li Zicheng suffered a complete failure. A geisha played a huge joke on the historical heroes at a time when history was undergoing great changes.

Chen Yuanyuan’s story was deposited in the Qinhuai River like the dregs of history. As history gradually faded away, some light began to shine in her body. When Lu Ciyun of the Qing Dynasty described her in "Xinzhi of Yuchu", he said, "The sound is the best in the world, and the color is the best in the world." It is precisely because of this that she brought a disaster to the Han people in China. And this disaster extends for hundreds of years. The Qing Dynasty's seclusion, the entry of the Eight-Power Allied Forces, the burning of the Old Summer Palace, the signing of the Nanjing Treaty, etc. are all continuations of this disaster.